


When the Train Has Left the Station

by Muccamukk



Category: Band of Brothers (TV 2001)
Genre: Clothed Sex, First Time, Love Confessions, M/M, Miscommunication, Officer Candidate School, Pre-Canon, Semi-Public Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 17:55:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27900367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Muccamukk/pseuds/Muccamukk
Summary: After they graduate from OCS, Dick waits until the last possible moment to confess his feelings.
Relationships: Lewis Nixon/Richard Winters
Comments: 20
Kudos: 96
Collections: Loose Lips Sink Ships Prompt Meme





	When the Train Has Left the Station

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Anthrobrat for beta reading. <3
> 
> Title from "Love in Vain" by Robert Johnson.
> 
> Written to fill the Loose Lips Sink Ships prompt: "Messy, clumsy, half-clothed first time" which I sorta managed.

By the time they got to the train station in Columbus, Dick had worked out all the details of his plan. He was going to tell Nix how he felt, right there on the platform, and from there it would go one of two ways: Nix would either be disgusted or otherwise upset, at which point Dick would never have to see him again, or Nix would reciprocate, and they could agree to write until the war was over. If Dick were a gambling man, he'd bet the farm on the former, which was why he hadn't said anything over the three months at OCS, no matter how many times he'd caught Nix's eye and wondered: _maybe_.

Nix of course, wasn't cooperating. He was half cut, which Dick had expected, and making a constant stream of jokes about how he wasn't Dick's wife, and didn't need to be walked to his platform in order to stay clear of men of ill intent. Neither the word "wife" nor the mental image of Nix being accosted by strange men in train stations were doing much good for Dick's concentration.

"For Christ's sake, Dick" Nix was saying, and somehow having his hand on Dick's wrist was vital to getting his point across, "The train up to Croft doesn't leave for two hours. What are you going to do? Sit in that dingy little waiting room and read field manuals?"

"I was thinking about it," Dick said, and since Nix's hand was on his wrist, looped his arm through Nix's as pulled him off towards the edge of the press of newly minted officers. He'd been trying to catch an earlier bus so it wouldn't be so busy, but hadn't been able to dislodge Nix until the last possible minute. "Listen, Lew."

"I'm listening; when am I ever not listening to you?" They were way down at the end of the platform now, almost at the steel fence that demarcated the passenger area. Lew pulled free of Dick's arms and braced one hand against a pillar so that he could cock his hip and—given how gone he was—not fall over while lighting a cigarette.

All the fresh lieutenants had been strutting their Class As for days now, a blinding parade of fit young men with gold on their collars, but Dick didn't think any of them had looked half as fine as Nix did slouched against a cement post, a cigarette dangling from his lips. The green jacket broadened his shoulders and pinched in his waist, the belt marking the first place Dick wanted to put his hands right after he knocked the garrison cap off Nix's messy hair. Dick had watched him shave that morning, but he already had enough stubble shadowing his cheeks to look slightly disreputable: the kind of boy Dick's mother warned his sister about.

"So what's on your mind?" Nix asked, and Dick realised he'd been staring and snapped back to his script, as awkward and inadequate as it now seemed.

"I'm going to miss you, Lew," he started. He'd thought that warming up with something innocent sounding would be the right kind of start.

"Sure, you too, pal," Lew said, giving a look to indicate that he wanted something a little more substantial having been dragged out of the station lounge and half way across the platform.

Fine, that at least Dick could do. "It's not going to be the same, going back to Camp Croft without you. I know you weren't there in the first place," he added as Nix shifted the smoke to the corner of his mouth to say the obvious, "but I've gotten used to having you around, you know?"

"Yeah, sure," Nix was looking at him curiously now, perhaps a little concerned. "Dick, there's not something wrong with you is there?"

There were a number of things wrong with Dick, but he didn't want to talk about them in this context. "No, listen," he insisted, stepping so close their gleaming shoes almost touched, "It's not like that." Nix shook his head, a little twitch side to side, a grimace to indicate he had no idea what Dick was talking about. "I've never felt about anyone like I feel about you," Dick said all in a rush, much earlier than he'd planned, but he could tell when an operation was going down in flames, and it was time to improvise.

"Felt about me?" Nix asked, and though Dick could see him starting to piece it all together

He didn't let him finish. "I'm in love with you," Dick said plainly. "I know you're married, and I know you probably aren't like that, but it's how I feel, and I wanted you to know." He jammed his hands in his pockets and waited for an answer. They were still standing far, far to close.

"Ha." Nix didn't laugh so much as say the word, but once he'd said it, he said it again, a firm, definitive, "Ha ha ha," that rolled into a real laugh, then he was leaning against the post for support, the cigarette dangling from his fingers dropping ash onto the pavement every time his body shook.

Dick's imagined responses had covered everything from a sincere reciprocation of his declaration, to being pushed in front of an oncoming train. He had not considered being laughed at, but given Nix's irreverence, that now seemed like an oversight. On the whole, he'd rather have gone with the train. He gritted his teeth and pretended his face hadn't turned scarlet with humiliation, and said as flatly as he could, "All right, that's enough. You've made your point, Nix." The nickname felt final even as it passed his lips, once affectionate, now a negation of everything he'd hoped for.

At least, if none of the rest of his plan had worked out, the part where Nix was leaving in half an hour was going to happen. After that, Dick could sulk back to the lounge and lick his wounds, presumably for the rest of his life.

Somewhere in Dick's haze of embarrassment, Nix had stopped laughing. Now he was looking at Dick and shaking his head, teeth flashing as he grinned. His face had turned as red as Dick's though his colouring didn't show it up as much. "You're unbelievable," he said.

"Evidently," Dick said through gritted teeth. He should probably hold his hand out to shake and say goodbye then walk away, but it felt like anything he did would just set Nix off laughing again, and he couldn't bear the idea of walking away with that laughter ringing in his ears. He'd always liked Nix's laugh, too, even when it was directed at Dick.

Nix dropped his cigarette and ground it out with his heel, even though he'd barely smoked half of it. "I can't believe you waited until _now_ to tell me."

Dick didn't have an answer to that. He now couldn't believe that he'd told Nix at all. How much better would it have been to keep the glow of this close to his heart and nurture it and let it warm him though the whole war ahead of him.

"Never mind," Nix said. "Come with me."

He was already walking back towards the lounge, not towards the platform gates, and Dick felt himself stuck like someone had glued his shoes to the ground. "Where to?"

"Park across the street," Nix said impatiently. "Chop chop, we've only got half an hour."

"Twenty minutes, Nix," Dick corrected automatically; he was following with seemingly the same lack of independent will to action now, too. "Why the park?"

"Men's room doesn't have as many MPs snooping around as the one here," Nix said, then added with a shrug, "Usually."

Dick didn't want to know how Nix knew if there were MPs in any given latrine. "Come on, Nix," he said, but even as he did, he couldn't escape the implications of their destination.

"I've been sniffing around you for _three months_ ," Nix was saying as they walked; it seemed to Dick like he was shouting, but that was maybe just the way each word rang inside his skull like a gong. "Three months, Dick! All those dropped hairpins, and invitations to town, and excuses to do inventory together. Inventory! And now, standing in a train station, right before I ship out to the other side of the country, maybe never going to see each other again, you come out with this!" Nix shouldered another butter bar out of the way and stomped past the gate into the street, barely glancing to see if there was traffic. "'I'm in love with you.' Jesus Christ!"

"Well, I am," Dick said. He couldn't tell if he felt more or less defensive now that Nix had stopped laughing and started criticising. It served him right for falling for someone with that easy wit and lack of regard for anything approaching honour or decency. It was still a funny feeling to have everything he liked about the man turned around into a weapon against him. "I take it you don't feel the same."

Nix jogged across the street, dodging an olive-drab half tonne that leaned on its horn as it skimmed by him, and Dick followed. When they were on the path of the city park, away from all possible eavesdroppers, Nix finally replied, "No, I'm about to screw you into a wall because I have no feelings about you of any kind."

"Nix," Dick snapped, but he'd long since come to understand that no amount of censure he could jam into that word, even into Nix's Christian name with both syllables drawn out, would do anything but slide right off Nix like water off greased canvas.

Stopping abruptly, Nix turned, and Dick nearly bumped into him—would have if Nix hadn't held out a hand and planted it on Dick's shoulder. "You can screw me, if you want," he said, and in that moment looked uncertain, showing a slice of lower teeth as he chewed on his upper lip. "Or I can suck you off?"

"I'd rather..." Dick stopped and cleared his throat. It was next to impossible to say anything sincere around Nix, who would always twist it into a joke. Usually Dick liked that about him, liked the way he didn't let any of the Army's indignities grind him down. Being around Nix made everything seem easier, everything except saying what he really meant. "I'd rather get a straight answer, Lew."

He watched Lew's expression twist from disbelief through embarrassment before finally settling on smug self-assurance. "When have I ever given anyone one of those?"

It was a game, Dick realised, one where the stakes were Dick's pride and Nix's vulnerability. If Dick could get Nix to say more, he won, if he just kept pouring his heart out with no return, Nix did, or they both lost; he wasn't sure. "You know," he said in a tone of pointedly feigned contemplation, "I think I'd rather screw you into that wall."

"Better hurry," Nix said and started again through the park. He obviously knew it, finding his way through the hedges and trees to a low brick building that smelled too much like piss and not enough like bleach. This was probably what being with Nix was going to be like, if they ever got to be together again: a series of compromises and indignities, proving his affection in return for a sarcastic comment and a whiskey-soaked kiss. At least Dick hoped there'd be a kiss. If there wasn't, he was going to leave Nix in the men's room with his dick out and no satisfaction in his future.

At two in the afternoon on a Wednesday, there wasn't anyone there, convenient as only one of the two stalls had a door still on it. Nix let Dick lead him into it, and only when they were inside with the door latched with the flimsiest of steel hooks, asked, "You got any slick? Because I don't."

"Of course not," Dick grumbled, thinking this should have come up before they'd left the station, but they wouldn't have had time to buy anything anyway. "Don't have any condoms either."

They were standing chest to chest inside the stall, with next to no room between their legs and a toilet Dick refused to look at. The light above the stall was gone, but the dimness didn't hide Nix's smirk. "Guess no one's getting screwed. Thought you were one of those boyscout types: be prepared."

Dick sighed. He leaned back against the side of the stall and tried not to think about what might be rubbing off on it. "I guess I didn't think you were interested."

"Huh," Nix said, his surprise the most genuine feeling he'd let slip, other than annoyance. "I'd have figured you'd have me down as a pretty sure bet."

"Not really," was all Dick said. If he didn't know it would get thrown back in his face, and if it weren't patently ridiculous anyway, Dick would have said something about how he valued Nix too highly to take him for granted. As it was, he decided he was tired of waiting and leaned over to kiss Nix.

They didn't have the angle right, and Dick's nose bumped into Nix's cheekbone, and their teeth knocked. Dick put his hands on Nix's waist right over that belt, and Nix gripped his shoulders, and it all came together, then, and Dick remembered why he wanted to be here at all. Nix breathed in sharply as their mouths matched up, and Dick could feel the tension singing through his body, or maybe that was just anticipation. His muscles trembled under Dick's hands, and he was breathing too fast. Dick felt like his heart was in his throat, and he'd finally, finally taken a leap he'd been lining up for all his life, but now mid-flight he had no idea where he was going to land. He decided he would keep kissing Nix, whiskey and nicotine and all, and work out the details later.

Nix was making small, sensual noises of pleasure against Dick's lips, like the kiss was his favourite meal. One hand had come up from Dick's shoulder to cup the side of his neck and tip his head a little more, and now his thumb stroked against Dick's jaw, scraping against the faint stubble there. Each motion of skin against skin felt like it was spreading sparks across Dick's body, and he leaned into Nix's hand. He felt Lew open his mouth in response, and kept kissing him until he felt Nix's tongue against his lips. A surge of pleasure ran through him that it was Nix asking for more, Nix who wanted to hurry things along. Though of course it was also Nix who was about to miss his train if they didn't get a move on.

Dick pushed open Nix's jacket and felt around for the buttons of his fly. He could feel Nix's cock pressing against his hand as he worked down one button after another, and reached through his skivvies to get a good hold of it.

"Ah, hell," Nix muttered as Dick stroked his bare, dry hand up his cock. He tightened his grip on Dick's shoulder and neck, and jerked his hips against Dick's hand. "Yeah, keep doing that."

He didn't seem bothered about it hurting or not, or Dick getting off or not, seeming to only want the touch, and not caring what kind. If Dick had time, he'd pin Nix to down and touch him all over, screw him slowly until he begged to come, but of course he didn't and probably never would; all he had were these stolen minutes in a municiple park latrine. He moved his hand back to the root of Nix's cock and started to pull back more slowly this time, rolling his palm and fingers back and forth as he did, touch rough and dragging.

If he wasn't begging, Nix was at least whimpering, high, needy moans that would leave no doubt in the mind of anyone walking in what was going on in that stall. Dick tried to shush him, which just put a gleam in Nix's eye and made him moan all the louder as Dick's hand got to the head of his cock. That was Nix: managing to moan both for Dick and to spite him at the same time. Dick had never felt anything like the rush of possessiveness that filled him just then. Nix was letting him do this, in this nasty little stall, just because Dick had told him he loved him, and Nix seemed to be loving it. He was pumping his hips into Dick's grip, moaning, pulling Dick back into a kiss, and disarranging his hair so badly Dick was glad he'd automatically taken his cover off when he'd entered.

Dick started another slow pull along Nix's cock, dragging the skin over the stiffness beneath, and Nix's sloppy kisses and provocative moans became shaky, and his hold on Dick's shoulder more real. Dick pinned Nix's hip against the brick wall that bracketed one side of the stall, and slid his knee between Nix's legs to spread them wider, not because he needed room, but because he wanted Nix to hold still and take what he was given. The way that made Nix flatten himself against the filthy wall and tip his head back to give Dick his throat sent a bolt of lust through Dick from the top of his head down to his curling toes. His own cock strained against the inside of his pinks, aching to be taken out and stroked alongside Nix's. Dick told himself that if Nix wanted to touch him, he would, and Dick wasn't going to jerk himself off like he was the only one here, and left his trousers buttoned.

He almost didn't need to touch himself anyway, the thrill of having Nix writhing under his hands was as much satisfaction as he could wish for, more even, as his imagination hadn't carried to the way Nix's fingernails dug into his scalp, or the huffing moans that came with every breath now. Dick started stroking faster, trying to bring his hands into synchrony with Nix's moans, and letting his body carry them both forward. Nix gave up on trying to kiss Dick and pressed his face to his neck, panting open mouthed against his throat, as he let Dick draw his pleasure out. He held on tight as Dick rocked his body to a conclusion, then came all over the front of Dick's jacket.

"Oh for crying out loud," Dick muttered, and Nix laughed against his neck low and throaty, and didn't loosen his hold one bit.

"Jesus Christ," he muttered, and laughed again. "Where the hell have you been all my life?"

Dick shook his head. "Right there, Nix," he said. He ran his hand up Nix's spine, holding him in as close to an embrace as he supposed they'd ever get.

"Yeah," Nix agreed. "Guess you were." Then, without warning, he pulled away and dropped into a crouch in front of Dick, and started to lick his own come off Dick's uniform.

"Nix!" For once, he didn't know that he was putting enough meaning into that one word: shock at the filthiness of it, scepticism at the effectiveness of the chosen method of cleaning, and mostly a deep swell of desire at the idea of Nix's subservience, even if he was probably only doing it to get this result, especially if that's why he was doing it. He pictured Nix going lower, polishing Dick's boots with his tongue, and groaned, and took hold of Nix's shoulders to keep from grabbing his hair.

Nix was looking up through the locks falling in his eyes, watching Dick as he ran his tongue over the wool of Dick's greens. His own garrison cap had fallen off somewhere in all this, and his uniform jacket was still half unbuttoned. Dick had never seen anything so sinfully debauched in his whole life. Which, he had to admit, wasn't saying much.

When Nix had done cleaning up, or at least done slobbering all over Dick's jacket, he flipped it open and started on Dick's fly, unfastening the buttons one handed while he used the other to balance himself on Dick's hip.

Dick let his head fall back against the flimsy wood of the stall and closed his eyes, trying to imagine being somewhere better, but the rattle of the wood and the persistent reek kept him there, with Nix crouching so he didn't have to dirty the knees of his pinks on the floor. The shock of cool air against his cock as Nix manoeuvred it out of his skivvies was replaced a moment later by the heat of Nix's mouth. Dick let go of Nix's shoulder so he could muffle his own cries against the inside of his elbow. He wanted to look down and see that dark head bobbing, as the persistent suction kept telling him was happening, but he thought the sight of Nix's pink lips wrapped around his cock would finish him in an instant. He wasn't going to last long anyway, not with Nix's hand now stroking his balls even as his head dipped up and down with the regularity of a steam piston.

Dick screamed into the rough wool of his uniform jacket and shoved his hips forward against Nix's hand, at the same time as he held his shoulders steady. Nix didn't miss a beat, and Dick wondered if he was like this with every guy: impersonal, fast, immensely skilled. Dick couldn't even describe what Nix was doing with his tongue, just that it felt amazing and he wanted more. Dick wanted to feel Nix's mouth when he was taking his time, long, lingering mornings waking up in bed together, drunken goodnights, Saturday afternoons off duty with no real plans.

At the last moment, right as he tumbled over the edge, Dick looked down, and found Lew still looking back up at him, a plea in his dark eyes, mouth as bright as if it'd been painted and wrapped around the very end of Dick's cock. He could have been one of those pornographic postcards that got passed around, except for that moment he was all Dick's.

"Lew," Dick gasped, and came.

In Dick's fantasies, Nix swallowed him down to the root and drank his come. In reality, he spat it into the toilet, but Dick found he didn't care. He even kind of liked that there was something a little fussy about Nix. He stroked his Nix's hair afterwards, finding that he did have pomade in it after all, and the disarrangement had been artful, and that too made him feel immensely fond.

Nix tucked Dick back in and buttoned him up then did the same for himself before collecting his cover from the floor and grimacing at it. He beat it against his knee, which didn't make it any better. Dick flipped the latch up, and they both went to share the sink, Dick using his handkerchief to mop at the spit and come on his jacket, and Nix trying to rinse his cap.

"Shouldn't wear your cover inside," Dick commented primly, and Nix snorted.

"You know me: always big on protocol." The mirror was cracked and smeared but it still gave Dick the first straight look at Lew's face, and instead of the smirk he'd have expected, Nix kept flicking his eyes over to Dick, gauging his response, then glancing away. It was the most unsure that Dick had ever seen him. Dick caught his wrist to still his hand, then took the cap away. He carefully dabbed at it with the cleanest remaining part of his handkerchief, and then handed it back. Nix's fingertips ran across Dick's knuckles as he took it. "Thanks," Nix murmured.

It was the brush of fingers that did it, a reminder of how often that had happened while they'd been at OCS, how many times Dick had wished he could be sure it was on purpose. According to Nix it absolutely had been. All at once, Dick couldn't stand the ambiguity: whatever Nix had meant this tryst to mean, Dick didn't want it left unspoken.

"You still owe me that straight answer," Dick said, standing between Nix and the way out.

Nix twisted his body sideways, like he was going to slide past Dick and escape, but he stopped himself and looked Dick in the eye before saying, "I'm going to miss my train."

"Now that would break my heart," Dick said flatly, every ounce of sarcasm was intended, but the double meaning was true as well. If all Nix could offer him was rushed, filthy sex in the latrines, Dick would rather have taken that sock to the jaw. But Nix's eyes were full of a demand for escape, and Dick should have been better at denying him now, but was not. He stood aside, and Nix bolted.

Dick took off after him, his longer legs making it easy to catch up, but Nix wasn't running, either, not like he could have been. For all his slothful artifice, Nix had passed every PT test the army had thrown at him, his marks solidly in the middle of the pack. He could give Dick a run for his money when he wanted to; now, he wanted Dick to be able to keep up.

"So," Dick said, trying to settle into his disappointment with some level of grace. He'd told himself that he wasn't going to whine and cling if Nix didn't want him, but that was more difficult than he'd expected. "California, huh? That's near your mom, isn't it?"

"Ha," Nix said, that non-laugh again. "Guess it is; she got me the assignment."

"Figure you'll be there for long?" Dick couldn't imagine sitting out the whole war as a base MP, but he supposed it was possible. Nix's family certainly had the connections. Was it better or worse to think that he'd be safe the whole time Dick was in combat? Dick couldn't tell: he'd like to know that Nix was all right, but he wasn't sure he wanted to be in love with a coward. Then, it wasn't like Nix had ever been anyone but Nix, and it wasn't like Dick hadn't always known that. Besides, he could be brave when the moment called for it.

Nix shrugged, jogged across the street again, this time avoiding traffic more deftly. The train had already pulled in and was loading, they only had a few moments left, and Dick had no idea what to say in them: "So long and thanks for sucking me off," he supposed was the best fit, but he could no more say that than ask Nix again for an answer he'd never give.

Dick stood on the platform with the other young officers flowing around him, tucked his hands behind his back like he was at parade rest, and nodded cordially. "Guess I'll see you around, huh."

"Dick." Nix looked almost ashamed. He was already half turned away, his body angled to go to the train, but his feet stuck in place and his attention fixed on Dick.

Dick should have told him it was alright, that he hadn't really expected more from Nix than an evasive answer and a good time, but it seemed that when it came to the end, he couldn't bring himself to lie. "I'll write to you," he promised, though he couldn't imagine what he'd say.

"I'm no good at writing," Nix said. The crowd was thinning, and the conductors started to snap up the stairs, but still Nix wasn't moving. "That's why"—he left a space to encompass what they'd just done—"I wanted to give you something to remember me by. Just in case."

"In case what?" Dick asked blankly. He didn't want to think about the years between this moment and any possibility of seeing each other again.

"I didn't want to say anything. It might not pan out," Nix told him, "and I didn't know you felt like you said, until you said it, but I, uh, applied for a transfer to the Airborne." Dick didn't know what to say to that, but his face must have had enough questions written across it for Nix to add: "Seemed like the only way you'd let me stick around."

He didn't say anything else, didn't have time, just clapped Dick on the shoulder and sprinted across the platform, bounding up into one of the train compartments seconds before the conductor slammed the door.

In a movie, there'd have been a whistle of steam, and Nix would have ran back along the cars as the train slowly gained speed, Dick keeping pace along the platform. But this wasn't a movie, and that wasn't Nix's style anyway. Dick stood and watched the sleek diesel start to drag the carriages out of the station, the windows flashing in the afternoon sun, and let the light blind him, and the memory of looking down at Nix with his mouth wrapped around his cock play over them.

It was, he thought, the only kind of promise Lew could give him, aside from the one about how he was willing to die for his country, just so Dick would keep being his friend.

It wasn't what Dick had planned to hear from Nix, on either the good end of the spectrum of the bad, but Dick supposed that if he was going to "let" Nix stick around, he'd have to get used to his plans taking unexpected turns.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos totally make my day, and I very much appreciate comments of every length, percentage of emoji, and level of coherency.


End file.
